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Three pairs of novel enantiomeric 8-O-4′ type neolignans (1a/1b–3a/3b), together with seven known analogues (4–10), were isolated from the whole plants of Saussureamedusa. Their structures were elucidated by extensive spectroscopic data analysis and electric circular dichroism (ECD) calculations after chiral separations. All compounds were obtained from S. medusa for the first time, and compounds 1–3 and 5–10 had never been obtained from the genus Saussurea previously. The anti-inflammatory activities of the compounds were evaluated by determining their inhibitory activities on the production of NO and inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) expression in LPS-stimulated RAW 264.7 cells. Compounds (+)-1a, (−)-1b and 5–7 inhibited NO production and had IC50 values ranging from 14.3 ± 1.6 to 41.4 ± 3.1 μM. Compound 7 induced a dose-dependent reduction in the expression of iNOS in LPS-treated RAW 264.7 cells. Molecular docking experiments showed that all active compounds exhibited excellent docking scores (

Organic dye based NIR-II fluorescent probes, owing to their high signal-to-background ratio and deeper penetration, are highly useful for deep-tissue high-contrast imaging in vivo. However, it is still a challenge to design activatable NIR-II fluorescent probes. Here, a novel class of polymethine dyes (NIRII-RTs), with bright (quantum yield up to 2.03 %), stable, and anti-solvent quenching NIR-II emission, together with large Stokes shifts, was designed. Significantly, the novel NIR-II dyes NIRII-RT3 and NIRII-RT4, equipped with a carboxylic acid group, can serve as effective NIR-II platforms for the design of activatable bioimaging probes with high contrast. As a proof of concept, a series of target-activatable NIRII-RT probes (NIRII-RT-pH, NIRII-RT-ATP and NIRII-RT-Hg) for pH, adenosine triphosphate (ATP), and metal-ion detection, were synthesized. By applying the NIRII-RT probe, the real-time monitoring of drug-induced hepatotoxicity was realized.

Objectives: An ethanol extract of the whole plants of Saussurea medusa had been investigated to find novel anti-inflammatory sesquiterpenoids. Methods: Extensive spectroscopic data and chemical methods were applied to elucidate the structures of the compounds. Results: One new megastigmane sesquiterpenoid (1), along with 11 known analogues (2–12), were obtained from S. medusa. All isolates, except compounds 3 and 6, were mentioned from the studied plant for the first time. Compounds 1, 2, 4, 5, 7, 8 and 12 were firstly isolated from the genus Saussurea. Compounds 2, 9 and 10 were found to inhibit the lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced release of NO by RAW264.7 cells with IC50 values ranging from 21.1 ± 1.7 to 46.7 ± 1.9 μM. Furthermore, iNOS expression experiment was performed to examine the interactions between the active compounds and the iNOS enzyme.

© 2017 IOS Press and the authors. The fruit images on points cloud acquired by the current 3D scanner from field will appear a visible seams, inconvenient data acquisition or taking large space due to unorganized background. We give a SAOW method to cope with the space efficiency and realistic effects of texture synthesis on pear point model. At first, a point-quadtree is proposed to simplify the pear image division. Then, an adaptive multi-granularity morton coding scheme are presented to optimizing the memory space of pear image. At last, weighted oversampling mixing method is mainly focused on texture quality of pear surface. As shown in the experiment results, our adaptive division makes the memory space decline dramatically about 90.7% than non-division and 92.9% than general division respectively; adaptive code scheme helps to reduce the memory to 72.1% of ordinary morton code; weighted oversampling keeps the mixed texture more real and smoothly than current methods.

We report here a single-benzene based fluorescent framework, amino-terephthalonitrile, denoted SB-Fluor. This scaffold displays versatile emission wavelength tunability via structure modification, covering the full visible light spectrum, both in the solution and solid state. Moreover, one molecule, SBF3, exhibits polymorphism-dependent reversible mechanochromic luminescence.

Two new sesquiterpene pyridine alkaloids, Chinese bittersweet alkaloid A (

Fluorescent dyes have enabled much progress in the broad range of biomedical fields. However, many commercially available dyes suffer from small Stokes shifts, resulting in poor signal-to-noise ratio and self-quenching on current microscope configurations. In this work, we have developed a general method to significantly increase the Stokes shifts of common fluorophores. By simply appending a 1,4-diethyl-decahydro-quinoxaline (DQ) moiety onto the conjugated structure, we introduced a vibronic backbone that could facilely expand the Stokes shifts, emission wavelength, and photostability of 11 different fluorophores by more than 3-fold. This generalizable method could significantly improve the imaging efficiency of commercial fluorophores. As a demonstration, we showed that the DQ derivative of hemicyanine generated 5-fold signal in mouse models over indocyanine green. Furthermore, the DQ-modified fluorophores could pair with their parent molecules to conduct one-excitation, multiple emission imaging, allowing us to study the cell behavior more robustly. This approach shows promise in generating dyes suitable for super-resolution microscopy and second window near-infrared imaging.

To investigate the chemical and bioactive constituents from the stems and leaves of Micromelum integerrimum.The chemical constituents were isolated and purified by silica gel, Sephadex LH-20, and HPLC. Their structures were mainly elucidated on the basis of extensive 1D- and 2D-NMR spectroscopy and mass spectrometry. Their cytotoxicity and antimicrobial activities were tested by the SRB and turbidimetric methods, respectively.Two new phenylpropanoids and two known coumarins were obtained, and their structures were identified as microintegerrin A (1), microintegerrin B (2), scopoletin (3), and scopolin (4). All of the compounds were tested for their cytotoxicity against three cancer cell lines (HeLa, A549, and BGC-823) and for antimicrobial activity against the fungus Candida albicans and the bacterium Staphylococcus aureus.Two new phenylpropanoids 1 and 2 were isolated and identified from the stems and leaves of M. intgerrimum. None of the compounds showed cytotoxic or antimicrobial activity at the tested concentration of 20 μg·mL(-1).

In order to improve energy utilization rate of biogas engine-driven heat pump (BEHP) systems for wastewater treatment plant, the exergy analysis is applied in this paper. The paper concludes the exergy losses and exergy efficiency of each equipment, and reveals the weak link of energy transformation of the whole system. According to the calculation of one example, the location of maximum exergy loss is the biogas engine-driven, while the location of minimum exergy efficiency is the compressor, which provides powerful theoretic references to improve and optimize BEHP systems for wastewater treatment plant.

Two moderately halophilic strains, SL014B-69T and SL014B-62A2, were isolated from a saline soil contaminated with crude oil in Gudao in the coastal Shengli oilfield in China; the isolates were Gram-negative, rod-shaped and carried lateral flagella. Growth occurred at NaCl concentrations of 1–20 % (w/v), at temperatures of 10–42 °C and at pH 8.0–9.0. Strain SL014B-69T had C18 : 1 ω7c (28.61 %), C19 : 1 cyclo ω7c (27.97 %), C16 : 0 (19.66 %) and C12 : 0 3-OH (8.87 %) as the predominant fatty acids and Q9 as the major ubiquinone, with the G+C content of genomic DNA being 64.0 mol%. Phylogenetic analyses based on 16S rRNA gene sequences indicated that the two strains belonged to genus of Halomonas in the Gammaproteobacteria, with the highest 16S rRNA gene sequence similarities of 96.4 % with Halomonas campisalis ATCC 700597T and 96.0 % with Halomonas desiderata FB2T. DNA–DNA relatedness of strain SL014B-69T with strain SL014B-62A2, H. campisalis ATCC 700597T and H. desiderata DSM 9502T was 97.4, 42.9 and 36.8 %, respectively. On the basis of these data, a novel species of the genus Halomonas, Halomonas gudaonensis sp. nov., is proposed for strain SL014B-69T and SL014B-62A2. The type strain is SL014B-69T (=LMG 23610T=CGMCC 1.6133T).

A new benzene derivative microintegerrin C (1) and a new norsesquiterpenoid microintegerrin D (2), along with six known compounds (3-8), were isolated and identified from stems and leaves of Micromelum integerrimum by various chromatographies such as silica gel, Sephadex LH-20, RP-18 column chromatography and HPLC. Their structures were mainly identified based on the spectral data analysis such as 1D-, 2D-NMR and HR-EI-MS. All known compounds were isolated from this plant for the first time.

To observe the efficacy and features of treating early-to-middle stage nontraumatic osteonecrosis of femoral head (NONFH) patients by Jianpi Huogu Recipe (JHR).Using retrospective paired control method, early-to-middle stage NONFH patients treated by JHR and followed-up for 2 years were recruited as the test group (47 cases). Those accepted surgery of core decompression, focus debridement and bone graft were recruited as the control group (48 cases). Radiographic images and clinical data of patients were collected before and after treatment. The stable rate and excellent rate of Harris score were taken as efficacy evaluation indicators.(1) There was no statistical difference in excellent rate of Harris score between the two groups (95.74% vs. 79.17%, P0.05). But better effects were obtained in the test group in relieving pain, improving joint deformation, joint mobility, and total Harris score (P0. 05, P0. 01). There was no statistical difference in the stable rate of radiography between the two groups (74.47% vs. 75.00%, P0.05). (2) There was no statistical difference in the stable rate of radiography at phase II and Ill [staging by Association Research Circulation Osseous (ARCO)] between the two groups (82.05% vs. 80.00%, 37.50% vs. 50.00%, P0.05). (3) The stable rate of radiography and excellent rate of Harris score were obviously higher in ARCO phase II patients than in ARCO phase Il patients (82.05% vs. 37.50%,97.44% vs. 87.50%, P0.01).Equivalent stable rate of radiography to that of surgery could be obtained in treating early-to-middle stage NONFH patients by JHR. But it was better than surgery in relieving pain, improving joint deformation and joint mobility.

Bioactive gibberellins (GAs) are a type of important plant growth regulators, which play the key roles in multiple processes, such as seed germination, leaf expansion, flowering, fruit bearing, and stem development. Its biosynthesis is regulated by a variety of enzymes including gibberellin 3-oxidase that is a key rate-limiting enzyme. In Arabidopsis, gibberellin 3-oxidase consists of four members, of which AtGA3OX1 and AtGA3OX2 are highly expressed in stems, suggesting the potential roles in the stem development played by the two genes. To date, there are few studies on AtGA3OX1 and AtGA3OX2 regulating secondary wall thickening in stems. In this study, we used the atga3ox1atga3ox2 double mutant as the materials to study the effects of AtGA3OX1 and AtGA3OX2 genes on secondary wall thickening in stems. The results indicated that simulations repression of AtGA3OX1 and AtGA3OX2 genes resulted in significantly reduction of secondary wall thickening of fiber cells, but not that of vessel cells. Three main components (cellulose, hemicelluloses, and lignin) were also dramatically suppressed in the double mutants. qRT-PCR analysis demonstrated that the expressions of secondary wall biosynthetic genes and the associated transcription factors were obviously affected in AtGA3OX1 and AtGA3OX2 double mutant. Therefore, we presume that Arabidopsis AtGA3OX1 and AtGA3OX2 genes might activate the expression of these transcription factors, thus regulate secondary wall thickening in stems. Together, our results provide a theoretical basis for enhancing the lodging resistance of food crops and improving the biomass of energy plants by genetically engineering Arabidopsis AtGA3OX homologs.

To study the mechanism of Huogu I formula (I) in treating osteonecrosis of femoral head.Forty-eight healthy female Leghorn chickens were randomly divided into control group, model group and Huogu I group, and each group consisted of 16 chickens. At the meantime of model establishment, chickens of the Huogu I group were administrated with decoction, while the model and control group with distilled water by gavage. At the 8th and 16th week after medication, blood samples were obtained for blood lipid detection while both sides of femoral head were harvested for the rest of examinations. Specifically, expressions of bone morphogenetic protein-2 (BMP2), transforming growth factor beta1 (TGFβ(1)), Smad4 and Smad7 were evaluated by immunohistochemistry, while expression of osteoprotegerin/receptor activator of nuclear factor kappaB ligand (OPG/RANKL) mRNA was detected by in situ hybridization.Compared with the control group, serum levels of total cholesterol (TC), triglyceride (TG) and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) in the model group rose significantly. Positive cell counting of BMP2, TGFβ(1), Smad4 and OPG in femoral head of the model group dropped prominently. Positive cell counting of Smad7 and RANKL increased dramatically. In contrast with the model group, levels of TC, TG and LDL-C in Huogu I group reduced significantly. Positive cell counting of BMP2, TGFβ(1), Smad4 and OPG in femoral head of the Huogu I group increased prominently. Indices of Smad7 and RANKL both decreased significantly. Especially at the 8th week, these variations were more significant.Huogu I formula is effective in promoting repair of necrotic femoral head by regulating the expressions of BMP2, TGFβ(1), Smads and OPG/RANKL of osteoclast in femoral head.

Based on the MEOR mechanism study of Brevibacillus brevis and Bacillus cereus, From 2002 to 2004, the two strain and other microbes were applied in the microbial huff and puff as well as the Microbial enhanced waterflood test in Daqing excessively low permeability (1.0md-25md) reservoir. After bacteria injection, 44 among the 60 huff and puff wells shows a significant oil production response—the accumulative oil increment reaches 9175.5 tons and the input-output ratio amounts to 1: 8. The Microbial enhanced waterflood test carried out in June 2004 also provides a satisfying result. After the injection of bacteria, the pressure in the two water injectors decreased more than 2MPa, which results in an injection capacity increase. The Analyse result of production fluid indicate that the selected bacteria can adapt the stratum conditions better and can grow and reproduce. They degrade heavy hydrocarbon, improve character of crude oil and metabolize active substances. The fluid production of trial field increase and water cut decline. in late 2005, 7 production wells among 10 production wells get good effect. Fluid production increased from 50.7 tons per day (before bacteria injection) to 68.3 tons per day, and the corresponding water cut declined from 46.8% to 40.3%.oil production is increased from 24.7 tons per day (before bacteria injection) to 40.8 tons per day. The accumulative oil increment more than 5800tons and the input/output ratio is 1:5. These make MEOR a very promising and effective oil recovery method in Daqing low permeabilityreservoirs.

Background Steroid usage has been considered as a leading cause of non-traumatic osteonecrosis of the femoral head (ONFH), which is involved in hypo-fibrinolysis and blood supply interruption. Genetic polymorphisms in plasminogen activator inhibitor-1 (PAI-1) have been demonstrated to be associated with ONFH risk in several populations. However, this relationship has not been established in Chinese population. The aim of this study was to investigate the association of PAI-1 gene polymorphisms with steroid-induced ONFH in a large cohort of Chinese population. Methods A case–control study was conducted, which included 94 and 106 unrelated patients after steroid administration recruited from 14 provinces in China, respectively. Two SNPs (rs11178 and rs2227631) within PAI-1 were genotyped using Sequenom MassARRAY system. Results rs2227631 SNP was significantly associated with steroid-induced ONFH group in codominant (P = 0.04) and recessive (P = 0.02) models. However, there were no differences found in genotype frequencies of rs11178 SNP between controls and patients with steroid-induced ONFH (all P > 0.05). Conclusions Our data offer the convincing evidence for the first time that rs2227631 SNP of PAI-1 may be associated with the risk of steroid-induced ONFH, suggesting that the genetic variations of this gene may play an important role in the disease development. Virtual slides The virtual slide(s) for this article can be found here: http://www.diagnosticpathology.diagnomx.eu/vs/1569909986109783.

Background Treatment with steroids covers a wide spectrum of diseases in clinic. However, some users are suffering from serious side effects of steroid administration, while we enjoy the benefit it brings about. Osteonecrosis of the femoral head (ONFH) is a troublesome one among them. Recent studies have demonstrated that lipid metabolism disorder may play a vital role in pathogenesis of ONFH and mutation of the paraoxonase-1 (PON-1) gene may be involved in the occurrence of this disease. However, the relationship between polymorphisms of PON-1 and ONFH has not been thoroughly studied. The aim of this study was to determine whether PON-1 polymorphisms are associated with steroid-induced ONFH through a cohort study among Chinese Han population. Methods This trial applied a case–control scheme to compare the clinical data including PON-1 SNP among 94 patients and 106 control subjects to analyze the association between SNP and risk of steroid-induced ONFH. Time of Flight Mass Spectrometer is utilized for genotyping and the result was analyzed in multivariate analysis models. Results According to polymorphism test of rs662, its SNP was significantly associated with the risk of ONFH in overdominant analysis model [P value: 0.022; odds ratio (OR): 0.39]. However, genotype frequencies of rs662 of PON-1 gene between case and control group showed no differences (P > 0.05). Conclusions Our data suggest for the first time that SNP (rs662) of the PON-1 gene was associated with the risk of steroid-induced ONFH. In addition, PAI-1 SNPs may play an important role in pathogenesis of ONFH. Virtual slides The virtual slide(s) for this article can be found here: http://www.diagnosticphatology.diagnomx.eu/vs/1501829501107336.